


The Trouble With Wanting

by UninspiredPoet



Series: Lacrymosa [5]
Category: World of Warcraft
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Difficult Decisions, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, F/F, Letters, Long-Term Relationship(s), Navigating Feelings, The Inability to Walk Away, Trauma, time apart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-21
Updated: 2019-03-21
Packaged: 2019-11-26 18:15:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,564
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18184046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UninspiredPoet/pseuds/UninspiredPoet
Summary: Sylvanas and Jaina haven't seen each other in a year. Dalaran has been purged, the Kirin Tor is allied to the Alliance, and Sylvanas will do anything to get Jaina to speak to her. She needs to know. No matter the cost. Set within Lacrymosaverse.





	The Trouble With Wanting

[](https://www.flickr.com/photos/161614435@N03/31672244908/in/datetaken/)  


The sound of quill-tip against parchment had long since died upon her ears. As had the sound of the Dreadgaurd’s retreat that she'd trusted her correspondence with. In fact it was eerily quiet as she sat, enveloped in the darkness of her inner chamber.

She hadn’t seen Jaina in so long. Once or twice, perhaps, since Theramore. And neither time had been very reassuring for either of them. Since then she couldn’t seem to get a reaction out of her no matter how she tried. She’d sent letters. She’d even made her way into Dalaran once at great personal risk to herself only to find Jaina’s door bolted and no sound from within. And no Modera to tell her where she was…

She knew Jaina was angry. She knew. Gods, did she know. She had felt that pain before even if she couldn’t imagine feeling something so raw now. But to do what she’d done...it was unthinkable. And she feared for her. She feared for who she’d become...and she was hurt. It took a lot to hurt her, now. But the slaughter and imprisonment of her own people...it made her wonder too many things. It distracted her too much. Too often. And she wouldn’t stand for it anymore. Even if it had conveniently taken care of the impending loss of the Blood Elves from the Horde. Even if she had found the collapse of the defection quite convenient. It server her to be angry with Jaina. It served her to tell herself she was. 

When she finally stood from her desk it was with a slow roll of her shoulders - an old attempt to loosen muscles that would never again need to be loosened. Muscles she couldn’t really feel. Not without Jaina. Her ears twitched faintly as she walked across the room slowly towards the usually empty hearth and nudged the coals she’d banked there with the tip of her boot before adding a fistful or two of fresh firewood to them - nursing them into a small blaze. She couldn’t tell if the room would be warm enough for the mage. But she’d done her best. 

And why? Why had she cared to make the room warm? Why had she cared to do away with her usual armor in favor of something Jaina might find more familiar when she’d just waged small scale genocide against the Sunreavers? It was beyond her. It was infuriating. And it was all she could think about.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Jaina’s hands trembled uncontrollably as her eyes scanned the parchment she’d found slipped under her door for what felt like the dozenth time. Her mind was a muddled pool of emotion and there were already drying stains on the yellowed page from her tears. She wondered idly if Sylvanas even really knew how long it had been since they’d seen one another. She wondered what a year felt like to an elf. An undead elf, at that.

She knew what it felt like to her. An eternity. A lifetime. A _thousand_ lifetimes. And every word her eyes traced over drove the knife that much deeper within her chest. She could feel it grinding against her heart and grating against her lungs with every beat - with every breath.  
She still didn’t hear the Banshee’s voice in the gently sloping handwriting. In the grace of the lines that she’d never seen matched by anyone else. It hadn’t changed. Not at all. These were the same looping, otherworldly pen strokes she’d first seen as an apprentice. A ruthless reminder that no matter how hard she tried to convince herself otherwise - there was something of Sylvanas left in the Banshee Queen. But the words themselves...Sylvanas would never have spoken to her in such a way. 

But she would, perhaps, never have done what she had, either. 

_Lady Jaina Proudmoore_

_I have tried to contact you on numerous occasions. This will be my last attempt at correspondence._

_Regarding the recent events in Dalaran, I am certain you know how I feel. Your childish recklessness has cost many lives and I am glad to know it has also cost you the allies you were trying to make of my people._

_Perhaps if you had not shut yourself off from me entirely, you might have had more control over your actions. You might have had a clearer head. But this is what you do. It is what you have always done and I shouldn’t have expected anything more from you._

_I risked my life and the lives of many members of the Horde to warn you about Theramore. You forget so easily. You remember what is convenient._

_You forget me because it is convenient._

_How strange that in cutting someone who no longer lives from your life you have become less human. Isn’t that what humans thrive upon? Honor? Integrity?_

_There is more integrity in every moss-covered stone of my sewers than there is in any order you’ve given, Archmage._

_If you mean to forget me - if you mean to never speak to me again - perhaps you should tell me. I grow tired of your games. I grow tired of watching you tear the world asunder when all you have ever had to do was open yourself to me._

_But I know now that that is too much to ask. I know now that it suits you better to stoke your own fires by wallowing in them._

_I only wish that if you have, in fact, forgotten me - that you could somehow afford me the kindness of allowing me to do the same._

_Shorel’aran,_

_Sylvanas Windrunner_

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Perhaps what hurt most about the letter now clutched in her lap was how difficult she found it to deny the truth of it. She had tried. Sylvanas didn’t fit into how she was discovering the world around her worked. She didn’t have a place for such a strong exception in her life. There wasn’t enough room among the anguish and the rage that constantly fought for control within her body alongside the maelstrom of power she was only just starting to grow accustomed to.

But she couldn’t. It had been so long now that her memory of the Queen’s scent had mingled with that of the Ranger-General’s in her mind. A confusing amalgamation of forest and leather and old, moth-eaten books and lavender. Over the years she’d begun to get used to the warmth that was missing from Sylvanas’s body. She’d begun to get used to her scent...even missed it when she wasn’t near. And there had been countless nights since she’d last seen her that she wanted nothing more than to find herself wrapped in the cold, steely strength of her arms and to be reminded exactly how her hair smelled now when it brushed her face. 

As if out of nowhere - the anger was back. Boiling up in her chest and her throat as she incinerated the letter without so much as a thought and stood. This was a game. Sylvanas was the one playing games. She wanted a reaction. She wasn’t _hurt_. She wasn’t _worried_. She was playing her like a fine instrument. 

The portal was summoned with such suddenness - such raw power - that the excess magic crackled away from her and throughout the room as she stepped through it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“It’s been delivered.” The Forsaken man spoke simply and almost solemnly as he stood in her doorway - looking at her with a touch of worry on his rotting features.

“To the third door of the far corridor, yes?” Her voice was cool and even as her red eyes brightened slightly when his words registered. 

“Yes, yes of course. Though I’m not certain who was inside the rooms. Only one person. That is all I can tell you.” 

Sylvanas had been about to elaborate when she felt the strangest sensation along her spine. Along her skin. And there was no sensation she yet felt as thoroughly as this. 

“Thank you, Warren. Go. Do not let anyone down here for the duration of the evening. I wish to be alone.” There was a certain firm urgency in her tone that left little room for argument - not that he would have to begin with. He simply pressed a closed fist across his chest and bowed his head before leaving and shutting the heavy door of her private quarters. 

He’d only just made it out of earshot when it both sounded and felt like lightning had struck down through the earth and into her very bedchamber. The stones caused the sound of the violently torn portal to reverberate around the room and her ears pressed back sharply as she readied herself - as unarmored and unarmed as she was - for whatever Jaina was about to do. 

And even with the distinct sensation of danger - of power that was, perhaps, beyond what she could counter right then - at least it was Jaina. And she was here. She’d scarcely dared to hope. But hope she had. And now she’d gotten what she wished for. And burning, silvery eyes illuminated the space around them and whitened hair blew in the field of energy as though the mage were wielding the sky and all its storms instead of a simple spell. 

“Tired, are you?” Jaina’s voice echoed oddly as the portal snapped shut behind her and her hair slowly laid down as the glow of her eyes gradually dimmed. But it didn’t disappear. And Sylvanas suddenly felt very underdressed...and very concerned. 

“Of what, precisely? Gods, I’m...I’ve given you exactly what you were wanting when you wrote that, aren’t I? Would you like to know what I’m tired of, Sylvanas? Of being manipulated by you. By the woman I loved. Yes. You wanted me to say it? You needed this, for some reason? Yes. I would like to forget you, now. Is that quite alright with you?” 

Sylvanas was usually adept at self-preservation. She had been for a good many years, now. But for some reason her better judgement and instincts rarely found the forefront of her thoughts when Jaina was around. 

“And if it isn’t?” She asked lowly - her eyes narrowing slowly as black doeskin clad feet touched the floor beneath her steps without a sound. “If it isn’t alright with me, how exactly does this go? Are you going to kill me, too, Jaina?” 

Jaina could feel every inch of her hands tingling culminating in an audible bristle of power at her fingertips. “Kill you?” Her voice was strangely disconnected and she did her best to ignore the falter in Sylvanas’s steps. The slight sinking of her ears. “You’ve been dead for years. I thought I was the one with the poor memory.” 

Any agitation or worry Sylvanas felt fled like mice from floodwaters as she blinked and her lips parted only for no sound to leave her. For a long time - neither of them spoke. The weight of the words just fell over both of them again and again. 

Jaina had rarely seen the other woman look the way she did right then. And every second that passed was another second for her to regret causing it. 

“You won’t hear from me again.” Sylvanas’s voice was a whisper. But even that whisper was full of an amount of emotion Jaina almost couldn’t process when it came from her any longer. “Forgive me for misinterpreting our situation. My memory, you know… It isn’t what it once was.” 

She walked past Jaina towards her desk, then. And for the first time Jaina noticed the fire that had been burning behind her and the warmth of the room. She noticed the older woman wore no cloak. Just breeches with light boots and a shirt that was rather plain - for her, anyway. 

And now that the decision had been made for her she found herself desperately wanting anything else. Anything at all. She had lost everything. Over and over again - without fail - she had lost everything.

The soft noise of Sylvanas pulling her chair back and sitting down in it made her jump and even the soft rustle of parchment was terribly loud to her suddenly. 

Instead of leaving she walked over to the desk carefully - once again just a person. One who was hurting. Lost. And terribly, terribly sorry. “Why did you write that letter?” She asked quietly when she was only a few steps behind Sylvanas’s shoulder - slightly to the side so she could turn her head to see her if she wished. 

“You can go, Jaina.” Sylvanas kept her voice quiet. She suddenly didn’t have the energy for much more and she certainly didn’t have an answer to that question. 

Faced with the prospect of losing what was left of her - Jaina felt frozen in place. Even when they didn’t speak for months at a time she knew she had her. She’d once thought she always would. 

“I didn’t mean that.” She breathed, taking the last few steps towards Sylvanas and reaching out to touch her shoulder hesitantly only to feel it tense beneath her fingertips, though she made no move to pull away or remove her hand. 

She gave no other indication she’d even felt it, actually. 

“How can you not mean something that’s true, exactly?” Sylvanas asked in response as she dipped her quill in the ink pot nearby. “And if you didn’t mean it, when will you stop doing before you think? Speaking before you think? Much could have been avoided if you would just stop for a moment. I tried, Jaina. I tried to help you after Theramore. I wasn’t the one who stopped trying.” 

The barbs hurt. They truly did. But it was nothing compared to the compounding of everything that had happened over the years and the reality that she had actually hurt her. That Sylvanas’s ‘too far’ was much different from her own. And that she had broached the subject she never had before. Not like this, anyway. “Please.” The slight break in her voice came when she tried to touch the side of the older woman’s neck with the backs of her fingers and she actually pulled away. 

Jaina pulled her hand back like she’d been burned and when she began stepping backwards Sylvanas caught sight of her from the corner of her eye - the hardness in her expression shifting into worry at the desperate helplessness she found in Jaina’s tired eyes. And the way her chest jerked and tensed as she tried to breathe without breaking while she lifted her hand and began to weave a portal - slowly. She couldn’t think clearly enough to trust herself to do it any more quickly than she was. And that was a strange sight to Sylvanas, too. 

She got up silently. Walked to her silently. Pulled both her hands from their casting into her own and tucked them between them and gathered her close. As close as she could. As close as she dared. She had to hold her that much tighter when she crumpled into a quaking, shuddering mass in her arms. She had no response for the mage’s sobs. She could only reach down behind her legs and lift her to carry her to the seldom used bed on the darker side of the room. 

Normally she might have gotten in beside her. Perhaps held her until she quieted down. This time she only pulled the dark, plush blankets back and helped her under them. Jaina reached for her but she was already too far and she brought her hand to cover her face - perhaps hide her shame at her sudden inability to internalize her emotions. “Talk to me.” She gasped into her palm as she forced herself to sit up. 

Sylvanas paused and turned to face her - brows furrowed and her expression more than a little weary. She had waited for Jaina to say those words and they had never come...now that they had she wasn't sure that she wanted to hear them anymore. But she never could deny the mage. Not really. Not for long. “About what?” She asked - her voice low and carefully measured. 

Jaina looked away from her then as she shivered despite how unusually warm it was in the room. “I don't know.” 

And just as Sylvanas began to turn away again the quietest, most heart rending of admissions found her ears. “I can't keep going like this. I can't. I can't do this anymore.”

Sylvanas knew she wasn't talking about what was between the two of them. And the alternative was so difficult to navigate she almost found herself wishing she _was_ talking about them. She made her way back to the bed and moved Jaina aside with her body when she sat with her back against the heavy, ornately carved headboard and spread her legs out to cross them at the ankles. When Jaina shifted to lay her head in her lap one of her hands found her hair almost on instinct. “I can't do it for you.” She finally murmured - staring straight ahead at the far wall before glancing down when she realized just how tightly Jaina was gripping her. She could scarcely feel it. “Would that I could. What would another few burdens be atop hundreds? But I'm afraid there is nothing to be done. And so you have no choice. You must keep going. Why you insist upon doing it alone I’ll never know.” 

Jaina turned her face towards Sylvanas’s lap and released a shuddering breath that finally drew the Banshee Queen’s full attention. Her mind worked furiously. What were the right words? How could she keep her? How could she make her okay? “You don't have to, you know.” She slipped her fingertips between her own thigh and Jaina’s chin and turned her head slowly so she would look at her. 

“We’ll never be anything more than this.” Jaina murmured - her reddened eyes focused on the red ones that seemed suddenly so gentle. “How is this enough for you?” 

Sylvanas rolled that question over in her mind for a moment and finally shook her head. “It just is. It just has to be. But I would certainly understand if it isn't enough for you. I would just prefer you telling me that instead of leaving me to wonder for...it's been nearly a year.” The realization was sudden and almost violent. Saying it out loud caused an internal shift she hadn't prepared herself for. It was easy to make it not real when she didn't force herself to deal with it...but now the thought of a year seemed to stretch beyond imagining. 

“I didn't know. I didn't know you could tell...and I didn't think it would bother you. There are a lot of things I don’t know, Sylvanas. Things I’m no longer sure of far outweigh the alternative, now.” Despite how quiet she spoke - she at least sounded more calm. More logical. To Sylvanas, anyway. 

“You can be sure of me.” She responded simply - though her brow furrowed after the words left her. She didn’t even remember thinking them before they’d come out. They’d just...happened. It felt so strange. But she must have meant that, right? Wasn't’ that how that worked? 

“You are, perhaps, the thing that I’m least sure of.” She admitted quietly as she slowly lifted herself from Sylvanas’s lap and leaned into her. 

The older woman turned slightly to face her and stroked her hair from her eyes with long, delicate fingers. “Whatever is left of what I was before is still as much yours as ever it was. And I’ll admit - I’m not certain just how much is left. Some days it feels like nothing at all. Others…” She trailed off and cradled Jaina’s face in her hand - kissing the corner of her mouth. It had taken a long time for her to learn how to kiss Jaina when she wasn’t truly able to feel her. But she’d learned. She’d learned so many things for her. “When you’re near...it feels like too much is left.” She kissed her again - this time on her cheek - and Jaina wrapped an arm around her side and buried her face in the crook of hre neck. 

“Is it too much?” Jaina asked quietly after a long, heavy stretch of silence. “Sylvanas, if…”

“No.” Sylvanas whispered almost urgently as her hand found the back of Jaina’s neck and grasped it almost tightly enough to bruise before she realized what she was doing. “Don’t say that...don’t ask me that. It doesn’t matter if it’s too much. I can’t be without it. I can’t be without you.” 

She glanced down in response to movement as Jaina’s arms wrapped around her more completely and she felt herself being pulled down into bed. She allowed it, of course. And she tensed at the now familiar tingles that ran up her spine as Jaina’s lips moved against the skin of her neck where they’d been pressed. 

And suddenly she could feel the warmth of Jaina’s hold. The little hairs along the nape of her neck beneath her fingertips. 

“You can’t give up, Jaina.” She murmured against her forehead before she kissed it and shifted so the mage could tuck her head beneath her chin. 

“Have you forgotten what I’ve done so easily?” She asked quietly - with absolutely no edge of petulance now. Just a genuine question. A worry. 

“No.” Sylvanas responded easily, stroking behind her ear with her thumb and breathing in against her hair now that she could smell it properly. The room really was warm. Perhaps too warm. She couldn’t really tell...she wasn’t used to feeling it. “But you are more important than the things you have done.” 

“You said I’ve become less human. Did you mean that?” There was a faint tremor in her voice but it was followed by a kiss against her throat that turned into another against the underside of her chin and a soft, slow breath left her in response. 

“You are all too human, Jaina. Your actions...your words...it is all human. I can’t pick and choose which parts of you I want and don’t want. I can’t pick and choose which traits of yours that I feel for years ago are currently doing what I would prefer them to do. All I can do is accept all of it. I have. Hundreds of times. I will only continue to, I imagine.” 

“For how long?” Jaina asked as she splayed her fingertips along the sharpness of Sylvanas’s jawline and grazed the little scars in the lobes of her ears that no longer held jewelry. 

She didn’t have an answer right away and she was surprised at Jaina’s sudden patience. Surprised at the gentle touches along her chest as well as the ones that were slowly sliding up her bare back beneath her shirt - allowing her to enjoy the sensation of patterns being traced against her cool skin. 

“Oh, a long while, I imagine. It’s been years and years since I could imagine a life without you. It’s been even longer since I’ve wanted to.”

Jaina relaxed in her arms, then. Relaxed and continued her slow, soothing touches. Touches that kept her close. Touches she thought about often in Jaina’s absence when she could no longer truly feel anything against her skin aside from the ghosts left behind by the mage’s fingertips. 

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry for keeping you away and for what I said to you earlier. I’m so terribly sorry, Sylvanas.” 

The Banshee swallowed rather thickly in response to that - feeling discomfort settle solidly in her stomach as she shut her eyes to hide them more than anything else. 

“I’m used to your pouting. It would be wonderful if you didn’t pout for a year at a time, however. If I’m being entirely honest. I’ve...m...I…” 

“Shh..” Jaina’s lips just barely touched her collarbone - exposed by the low, wide cut of her shirt. “I missed you every day. Every night. Every moment. Every time I decided not to unlatch my door. With every letter I burned instead of sending to you. I won’t do that again. You have my word. No matter how hurt or angry I am - I’ll be sure you know why I’m gone. And I’ll do my best to come back as quickly as possible. But never so long again. This nearly killed me.” 

“It wasn’t my decision, you know.” 

Jaina wrapped an arm around her waist and Sylvanas slowly draped one of her own around her shoulders, guiding her closer until they could twine their legs together with the blankets creating a tangle among their limbs. 

“It wasn’t. And it wasn’t a decision. It was a mistake. A mistake I’ve made every day for a year.”

Sylvanas didn’t need apologies. 

She needed this. Honesty. Recognition. 

She had such a hard time, now, in dealing with the varying hues of uncertainty.

No, she preferred blacks and whites and solid lines. Easily defined things that she could see and hear and touch. 

She preferred the truth of Jaina’s warmth pressed against her in the darkness of her rooms and the feeling of her chest rising and falling against her own. 

The honesty of her lips against her skin and of the slow breaths escaping past them. 

She needed to know her place in Jaina’s world. 

And the way she clutched her as she drifted off into exhausted, relieved slumber left little room for interpretation...and even less room for doubt. 

Her place was watching her rest. Counting her breaths and loosening her arms if she stirred only to hold her again once she was still. 

Her place was to be the shadow in Jaina’s life that was so menacing all other shadows fled before her and to blanket her in the darkness she sought until she could face the day again.

 

"The Trouble With Wanting"

Wandering soul  
Wandering mind  
Wondering what's gone wrong with me  
And try not to try  
Swayed by the wind  
Swayed by desire  
Can't reach the moon up above  
And I don't dare touch the fire

'Cause the trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
And I want you all the time

Always on my mind  
Always alone  
You could be miles and miles away  
But somehow you're close  
If I can't have my cake  
And I can't eat it too  
Well, I guess the sound of your voice  
In the aching will just have to do

'Cause the trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
And I want you all the time

And if you never come back  
If you never call  
I say I'll understand when I don't at all

'Cause the trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
And I want you all the time  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
The trouble with wanting is I want you  
I see you there and I see that line  
(The trouble with wanting is I want you)  
And I want you all the time  
Oh, I want you all the time


End file.
